Tuesday, April 19, 2011

The "Lost" History

Howdy Y'all!

I am not sure if you are with me - but, I hated history growing up and I made fun of my dad for constantly watching the History channel. Mrs. Hutt (for all you Westwood Junior Highers) and one of my professors in college (I can't remember his name) made history semi-enjoyable, but it was still never my favorite. I was a math girl, of course.

However, as I am getting older (and maybe wiser too), I am beginning to really love history. Traveling to Washington DC in August opened my eyes to history that I never knew. It was just "lost", I guess. I felt like such an idiot that I didn't know that when President Lincoln was assassinated that it was a big conspiracy. Was I the only one that didn't know that John Wilkes Booth didn't act alone? And, that there was a bigger goal in mind when he killed Lincoln. There were others that also tried to kill the Vice President and the Secretary of State. Of course, here I am in the Ford Theater learning all of this and feeling like a big ole dummy.

On Friday, there was a movie that was made about one of the people accused of being part of this conspiracy. It was a fascinating movie to me because I was learning more about a story that I didn't know much about. It makes me want to read books about it and learn more. I actually become a googling fool after watching something like this to see if I can find more and more information. I know what you are thinking, "Man, she is such a nerd!"

On Sunday, I watched the Kennedy mini-series as well. I had recorded them from the Reelz channel and finally got all caught up. Again, this was fascinating to me...I didn't know that JFK had an older brother that Joe Kennedy was grooming to become President, I didn't know JFK suffered from medical issues including a back problem and I didn't know about one of his sisters that was mentally handicapped and had a lobotomy performed on her causing her to live the rest of her life in a near vegetable state. And, as I just said above, I become so interested and was googling away while I was watching.

So, what is the point of all of my rambling?? Well, I am not sure if it would have made it anymore interesting, but it would have been great to have been taught some of these things instead of just the dates and basics about what took place. I get so much more out of history when I know the back story. If you know of some biographies or historical books that I could read to feed by nerdy desire, let me know. :)